Sunday, October 5, 2014

Nitpicking Haider

Haider
was terrific. Vishal Bhardwaj continues to demonstrate why he is the most
exciting filmmaker in India.

It’s
healthy to judge a movie for what it is, and it’s not fair to criticise a movie
for what it COULD HAVE been. But then this is VB and we’re movie buffs so
nitpicking is inevitable. As Varun said, the things the film did were way more
important and fascinating than the things it failed to do. But still, it would
have been a BLOODY MASTERPIECE if these nuts and bolts were tighter. Coherence
and consistency were missing. Lots of highs and then some abrupt lows.

So
here is some nitpicking:

1) Haider's
breaking point of madness was not well defined. We just see him sitting at his
father’s grave in a long shot. The next time we see him he's already bald and
bearded clowning in front of a crowd at Lal chowk. Hamlet PRETENDS to be mad at
that stage. In this movie it doesn't come across that Haider is pretending. So
on an acting standpoint Shahid didn't deliver fully in the scene, although he
gets much better later on.

2)
Haider's paranoia and craziness are also very surface level. Hamlet spends a
lot of time talking to himself, saying crazy shit. Haider doesn't do that. Sure
there is quirk, but it’s mostly forced quirk, and some of it was heavy handed
too. I would have liked 15 more minutes delving into the madness descent of
Haider.

3) The
lack of madness is a direct result of the sense of ambiguity being sorely
missing in the film. Everything is literal and real, unfortunately. Take for
example the Gravediggers ‘So jao’ sequence – it is glorious and bizarre. Until
the gravediggers start pulling out guns and shooting I thought Haider was
hallucinating them. That stretch before the shootout should have been much
longer. It could have helped expand upon Haider’s madness, and given us a
chance to wonder WTF is going on. As a film buff, the thrill of trying to
figure out if something is real or not, and picking out metaphors is unmatched.

4) Incidentally those two mysterious quirky Gravediggers with guns who kill
everyone in a shootout in the end, are a repeat of the two mysterious quirky
Bong goons with guns who kill everyone in a shootout in the end of Kaminey.

5) The
lack of ambiguity goes for the character of Roohdar as well. As pointed out by
NotsoSnob, it would have been terrific if Roohdar were ambiguous, naam se,
story se, barf me jam gaya and all, full ghostly. Some of the best lines in the
film belong to Irrfan, and he just kills it with his eyes. 10 more minutes of
an ambiguous Irrfan wouldn’t have hurt.

6) The
acting is great, but most of the characters in the movie are one note. They
don’t surprise. What they are at the beginning of the movie, they're the same
by the end as well. That includes Tabu with her beautifully tragic tear filled
puffy eyes. Why didn’t these characters have a second dimension? The element of
unpredictability and surprise is what I really missed, and that wasn't the case
in Maqbool and Omkara.

7) Shazarch pointed out that the
romantic song in the second half between Haider and Arshia, although fairly
decent to listen to, was totally unnecessary and jarringly out of place. It kicks
in right after a very tense scene. Clearly it was VB pandering to the
commercial audience here.

8)
They took out Hamlet's abuse towards Ophelia completely. I was half expecting Haider
to force himself upon Arshia instead of serenading romantically with her in
that song. Why? Because by that point Hamlet has already gone beyond romance
and sympathy - he is an abusive asshole. Like in the original source material
if Haider abused or raped her it would have justified Arshia losing her mind. Imagine
- the one person she stood up for and loved abuses her and kills her family. It
would have added more weight to her suicide. And the scene where Haider sees
her dead body would have had more weight as well, because his guilt would have
been tenfold.

9) In
fact that section between that romantic song and Bismil is where the movie
sags. It does pick up later, but I wish that portion was either tightened, or
dedicated towards Haider losing it, or Roohdar.

10) The
scene where Liyaqat (Aamir Bashir) gets a phone call in his office was terrible. Very
Bhandarkar way of showing that he is a 'corporate person'. Even his character
could have used more screen time/fleshing out.

11) In
the end the Indian army is credited with saving a lot of people in the Kashmir
floods. This was only done so because the movie mildly portrays the Indian army
in negative light, with respect to treatment of Kashmiris and terrorists. The
text in the end was a lame way to say 'oh don’t worry the Indian army does good
things also'. Of course this is a country which can’t accept anything
remotely out of the box, so VB adding that text is not surprising. And look
what happened – some effete idiots revolted anyway with #BoycottHaider.

12) The
Kashmir politics ‘seems’ ballsy because they showed the Mama 2 Interrogation
Center, but is actually surface level. It doesn’t give any deep insightful
message about the political wrangling in Kashmir. So the text in the end about
the ignominy of Kashmir due to terrorism doesn't make much of an impact (at
least for me). But I may be wrong, because this bloke was offended.
Perhaps it would have been better had VB just done away with explaining
anything via text. Moreover the censors handed the film 41 cuts, so a lot of what was lost probably hurt the film. In any case the movie isn’t about Kashmir politics, it’s about a
dysfunctional family surrounded by Kashmir politics. What the movie IS ballsy
about is the extent to which VB went with the dynamics between Haider and
Ghazala.

13) 'Aao na' was absent in the film. They tease the guitar strings so many times,
but the song doesn't play at all. Kind of frustrating since it's such a kickass track.